SFist in the Kitchen: Crayfish
When we first saw crayfish for sale at a farmer's market, we had a surprisingly strong reaction. The writhing mass of insect-like shellfish touched a primeval reflex, and we felt shivers along our spines. We hurried past, eager to get our twitching shoulders under control.
Fast forward a few years to the Grand Lake Market in Oakland. We spotted another crayfish vendor, but this time we subdued our frissons long enough to ask an important question.
"How do you cook them?"
The farmer working the stand, which also offers less mobile shellfish, gave us a simple answer: Bring water to a rolling boil, add the crayfish (or crawfish, or crawdads, or crawdaddies, all of which, like crab, descend from the Indo-European gerbh, to scratch or carve), and when the water comes to a boil again, they're ready to go.
Photos by Melissa Schneider.
Instead of the farmer's simple cooking technique, we (of course) made things harder for ourselves by adapting Bouchon's shrimp cooking technique. Bring some court bouillon to a rolling boil, toss in the crayfish, turn off the heat, and cover the pot for seven minutes. Possibly we overcooked the critters, but we had visions of half-dead crayfish suddenly making a break for the edge of our dinner plates, and we decided better safe than sorry.
Inevitably, that brings us to the topic of killing your own food. We in the SFist test kitchen believe that if you eat meat, you should, on occasion, kill your own dinner. Urban meat eaters are often too glib about the animal who died to provide their entrees. But most of you probably don't live on farms, and slaughterhouses aren't keen on volunteers, so fish and crustaceans are the easiest prey. (Freddie the Lobster might disagree, however.)
We get squeamish when it's time to do the deed, but we have to wonder about some of the suggestions for ethically offing crustaceans. Paralyze them by plunging a knife into the base of their "skull?" They don't have spines! Furthermore, the "brain" only gets signals from the eyes and antennae. Pet them until they get drowsy? Yes, and make sure to read them a bedtime story as well. Harold McGee's advice, based on marine biology, seems the most sensible: place the animals in iced water for thirty minutes. The crayfish farmer suggested that the refrigerator would be just as effective, but as SFist reader Sean pointed out to us, "The problem is that it takes them about five seconds to wake up." Sure enough, as soon as we unwrapped our package the next day, our ten crayfish were wriggling about, waving their claws and antennae. Ugh. Thank goodness for kitchen tongs.
Once you've boiled them alive, you can opt for a simple presentation. We served ours whole on a fruits de mer platter and let our guests struggle to remove the tail and claw meat. The meat reminded us more of flaky crab than succulent lobster. We like Txacolina with shellfish, but a good Muscadet or New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc would work equally well. If your guests aren't keen on tearing little crayfish bodies apart with their bare hands, consider making the delicious crayfish cakes that Chef Will Ownbey serves at School Street Bistro, one of our favorite Lodi restaurants. Chef Ownbey graciously shared his recipe when we wrote him. He suggests "a good Riesling, Sauvignon Blanc, or Chardonnay" to accompany these pan-fried treats.
We know you all probably have favorite crayfish preparations, so feel free to share them in the comments.
Market Note: Prather Ranch, one of our favorite meat vendors, now has a stall at the Grand Lake farmer's market in addition to their store in the San Francisco Ferry Building. We'll talk about them soon, but they offer grass-fed, dry-aged, organic, and altogether heavenly meat. They're pricey, but worth the occasional splurge, and they're not butchers, so you often end up with untrimmed cuts. We wish them luck at their additional location, and we encourage all our Oakland readers to swing by and say hi.
Recipe: School Street Bistro Crawfish Cakes
Note: Thanks to Chef Will Ownbey for taking the time to scale down his restaurant's recipe. He notes that his staff serves the cakes with julienned Tasso Ham and a Creole Hollandaise. He also adds that you can order crayfish tails from alwaysfreshfish.com if you want to forego the pleasure of dismantling crayfish.
- 1/2 stick (1/4 cup) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
- 4 large eggs, beaten lightly
- 6 tablespoons mayonaise
- 1 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
- 1 tablespoon Crystal Hot Sauce
- 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
- 2 tablespoons lemon zest
- 1 teaspoon onion powder
- 1 teaspoon salt or to taste
- 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
- 2 pounds fully cooked crawfish tail meat finely chopped (see note)
- 2 cups panko bread crumbs
- 1/3 cup cornmeal
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil
- In a bowl whisk together the butter, the eggs, the mayonaise, the lemon juice, the lemon zest, Worcestershire sauce, the Crystal Hot Sauce, the salt, and the cayenne and stir in the crayfish meat and the panko crumbs gently. Form 1/2-cup measures of the mixture into twelve 3/4-inch-thick cakes and transfer the crab cakes as they are formed to a baking sheet sprinkled with half the cornmeal. Sprinkle the cakes with the remaining cornmeal and chill them, covered with plastic wrap, for at least 1 hour.
- In a large heavy skillet heat the oil over moderately high heat until it is hot but not smoking and in it saute the cakes in batches, turning them once, for 3 to 4 minutes on each side, or until they are golden, transferring them as they are cooked to paper towels to drain. Serve immediately.